News Articles

Hawthorne Deli at 153 E. Broadway has been vacant for a while and we hear a new restaurant, Bon Mi, has opened in the space featuring Vietnamese and French-style cooking. The owner is Yoon Shil and we notice the place is already very busy with the lunch sandwich crowd.

A new outdoor market for artisans and farmers opened Aug. 4 at Irvington Grange on Irvington Drive in Santa Clara. The market will be open from 10 am to 4 pm on the first Saturday of the month through October, according to organizer Sarah Sabri. Email irvingmarket@gmail.com or call (503) 515-2490.

• The annual Eugene/Springfield Pride Celebration will be from noon to 7 pm Saturday, Aug. 11, at Alton Baker Park. Entertainment includes Wetsock, Spin Cycle Squares, Richard Mills, Champagne GaGa and the Imperial Sovereign Court of the Emerald Empire. The event is free but a $5 donation will be asked to help cover expenses. A “Rhapsody Under the Stars” annual coronation event is coming up Aug. 17-19 at Valley River Inn. See Facebook at http://wkly.ws/1c0

Timber Town growls and belches mostly outside of Tree Town’s collective consciousness. Conscious of it or not, we find our air is fouled by biomass burners, wood and paper processing gases and log treatment vapors.

Logging on Oregon’s O&C lands has been a source of controversy for years, with some arguing that the trees should be cut to generate funding for Lane and other historically timber-based counties, and others saying the days of chopping down the ecosystem to pay for county services need to end.

Cougar Mountain Farm is holding its seventh annual farm benefit, the Tayberry Jam, Aug. 3-5, to help fund advancements toward the farm’s development of a sustainable living center to further empower what has become its very own sustainable living movement.

The “little blue school” has been empty for 10 years. The community of Noti, 16 miles west of Eugene in the foothills of the Coast Range, saw the historic building close down in June 2002 due to budget shortfalls. But this year, it’s opening back up, according to Leontine Winters Krohn, president of the Noti Community Center. The school’s inaugural fundraiser is a production of Cinderella by Ballet Fantastique accompanied by live ’60s music from singing duo Shelley and Cal and their band at 2:30 pm Saturday, Aug. 4.

Clearcuts, thinning, retention, regeneration … forestry jargon aplenty was flying on July 29 when nearly 30 people gathered to tour the Long Tom forest 20 miles west of Eugene, and to see some of these forest management terms actually applied within the same landscape.

Have some pasta and honor a soldier: The nonprofit Honor Flight of Oregon is putting on an “all-you-can-eat spaghetti feed” Sunday to raise money to send World War II veterans from Lane, Lincoln, Benton and Linn counties to see war memorials in Washington, D.C., before the soldiers pass on. In 2011, the average age of a WWII vet was 92.

For about a century the Tour de France has showcased some the best scenery France has to offer as cyclists battle through small villages, pastures and mountains. This year Lane County is hosting its very own inaugural Tour de Lane Aug. 3-5 with rides kicking off from Richardson Park in Junction City. This non-competitive cycling festival will provide participants with a number of rides of varying lengths and difficulty.

Cornucopia’s Maize Lounge at 13th and Oak closed down without notice this past weekend and all future music gigs were canceled. Moving trucks were seen outside Monday morning, hauling off furniture and equipment for storage in a rented warehouse. Maize offered food, a full bar and a stage for live music. We hear a big hike coming in lease payments was behind the decision; Cornucopia’s other two restaurants are doing fine. Alison Albrecht and Nils Stark are owners of the business, but not the old building, which used to be a Cadillac dealership.

Bunnies being dumped out of a trailer, a rabbit being flung through the air and rows of screaming children bearing down on a cluster of bunnies paralyzed with fear: Red Barn Rabbit Rescue documented this and more at the “animal scramble” at the July 13-14 Cottage Grove Rodeo (see our blog post July 16). Animal advocates are seeking to put an end to this annual event that they say is cruel and irresponsible.

In the ongoing debate over whether people are smart enough to learn to use reusable bags, the Eugene City Council will continue exploring a ban on single-use plastic bags in grocery stores at a public hearing Sept. 17.

If this sounds familiar, Eugene postponed past discussions of a bag ban to see if a 2011 statewide ban would pass. It didn’t, and in the meantime individual cities including Portland and Corvallis have implemented local bans.

If you want to prepare a raccoon before cooking it, consult the 1970s edition of Joy of Cooking, which says “remove all fat, inside and out,” and then soak it in saltwater overnight in the refrigerator. But a more likely conundrum in Eugene these days might be: What if one bites you without being provoked?

Lane County has called in the USDA’s controversial Wildlife Services to trap a bear out of its Rattlesnake Road waste disposal site. But Brooks Fahy of Predator Defense questions why Lane County is spending the money to trap a bear when it’s letting criminals out of its jail.

Oregon has an estimated 25,000 to 30,000 black bears according to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, and bears showing up around human habitation is not uncommon.

Two of Oregon’s four known wolf packs, the Imnaha and the Wenaha pack, have each added four pups to the mix this year, bringing the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife count to approximately 37 confirmed wolves in Oregon, according to Josh Laughlin of Cascadia Wildlands. “And there’s likely more,” he says.

On June 27, ODFW announced a lactating female was caught on camera in the Eagle Cap Wilderness and pups may be in that area, too.

The grand opening of the Sweetwater Farm Stand at Centennial Dari Mart, 1243 Rainbow Drive in Springfield, was July 25. The mobile organic farm stand “brings farm fresh produce to the neighborhood convenience store,” according to Claire Syrett, the new manager of policy and advocacy initiatives at Lane Coalition for Healthy Active Youth. LCHA is one of the partners of this initiative, along with Willamette Farm & Food, Neighborhood Economic Development Corporation and Sweetwater Farm. The stand will be open from 4 to 6 pm every Wednesday through September.

• Breakfast at the Bridges begins from 7 to 9:30 am Friday, July 27, at the Greenway Bridge at Maurie Jacobs Park, across from the Valley River Center. The event will be every last Friday of the month through September. This summer series encourages walking and bicycling. Sponsored by Full City Coffee, Toby’s Foods and the city of Eugene.

Oregon isn’t the only place on the West Coast fighting polluting energy pipelines. The Unis’tot’en and Wetsu’wet’in First Nations have blockaded the pathway of five proposed pipelines collectively called The Northern Gateway leading from the tar sands out through ancient forests and native lands to the coast of British Columbia.

It’s high time for a rollback on the prohibition of the world’s most beneficial plant, activists say. Emerald Empire HempFest is gearing up for its ninth annual event at Maurie Jacobs Park July 20 to 22.

Fashioned after Seattle’s HempFest, the Emerald Empire HempFest is becoming something more than just a haven for pot paraphernalia and heavy tokers. “It’s all about education,” HempFest Executive Director Dan Koozer says.

Seneca Jones Timber Co. (541) 689-1011 is hiring Western Helicopter (503) 538-9469 to spray 223 acres in 3 units in the Camas Swale area with some combination of glyphosate, imazapyr and metsulfuron methyl and the surfactants/adjuvants methylated seed oil, Syl-Tak and Sylgard. See ODF notice 2012-781-00510.

Parvin Butte is still standing. Shorn of most of its trees and blasted by heavy equipment, the Dexter landmark lingers in the background as summer visitors play on Dexter Lake. The Dexter/Lost Valley neighbors are still fighting to save the butte from McDougal brothers and developer Greg Demers, whose company Lost Creek Rock Products (LCRP), has been decimating it. The latest skirmish took place in front of Lane County Hearings Official Gary Darnielle on July 12.